This post is part of the Modern Classics series, spotlighting movies released since 2000 that have already earned a place among the all-time greats.
Two Victorian London magicians (Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale) engage in a bloody rivalry that escalates as they both pursue the greatest magic trick ever performed.
Initial Reception
Released on October 20, 2006, The Prestige opened at number one at the domestic box office (narrowly edging out The Departed in its third week of release). The movie would go on to gross $53M domestic and $109M worldwide. It received good if not great reviews, with Roger Ebert giving it three stars and A.O. Scott of The New York Times calling it “a triumph of gimmickry”. The film also received two Oscar nominations: Best Cinematography and Best Art Direction.
Key Moment
Just when things seem to be going pretty good for Jackman’s Robert Angier (AKA The Great Danton), with his stage show becoming a sensation, Bale’s Alfred Borden (AKA The Professor) hijacks his performance in a violent and humiliating way. As the turn becomes painfully clear to Angier, Borden appears with a full Van Dyke beard, letting it be known that the pendulum has swung.
Killer Line
“Now you’re looking for the secret… but you’re not really looking. You want to be fooled.” (shoutout to the spoiler bumper for The Filmcast)
Standout Player
David Bowie. Every actor in this movie feels right, they all fall easily into character—from Bale and Jackman to Michael Caine, Rebecca Hall, and Scarlet Johansson. But Bowie is the chef’s kiss, a perfect piece of casting that feels essential rather than novel. He brings something otherworldly that adds just the right flavor to what Nolan is cooking up.
Achilles’ Heal
None to speak of.
Why It’s a Classic
For every great director, there’s a moment when their id spills like blood onto the screen. For Martin Scorsese, it was Mean Streets. For Steven Spielberg, it was Close Encounters of the Third Kind. And for Christopher Nolan, the Oscar-winning director of 13 feature films including the recently released The Odyssey, it was 2006’s The Prestige.
In weaving this tale of two warring magicians, we get a lot of Nolan staples—a high-concept idea, fractured storytelling, a dead wife (or two). But we also get a peak behind the curtain at what makes Nolan tick.
Adapted by Christopher and his brother Jonathan from a 1995 novel (of the same name), The Prestige is a movie about obsession. About wanting, nay, needing to be the best. And about going to great lengths to create something magical—often at great cost. It’s also about being pulled in different directions, between love/family and the compulsion to create.
It’s clear from the movie’s beginning narration—which makes the bold move of explaining how a magic trick works on the audience while ingeniously pulling that exact trick on the audience—that Nolan is the magician.
But he isn’t just one type of magician. In a movie with dueling illusionists, where the leads play multiple roles, he is all faces of the showman—using talent, cunning, technology, storytelling, bravura, and manipulation to feed his obsession to entertain the audience.
That obsession can be seen onscreen in The Prestige more than any other movie Nolan has made. Every frame is meticulously designed and crafted to feel lived-in. Every seed that’s planted in the screenplay—from the birds to the magician living his act—sprouts up later on. Every edit feels deliberate.
It’s no coincidence the marquee magic trick in this movie is called “The Transported Man”. Nolan’s goal is (and has always been) not only to make people’s jaws drop, but to take them somewhere they’ve never gone before. Himself included.
Quick Takes
The Prestige is Nolan’s fifth film, slotted between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. It’s the last modestly budgeted movie he made (with a reported budget of $40M), before he became a brand name. It was also his last movie to earn under $500M at the worldwide box office (not counting Tenet, which was the first movie released in theaters after COVID and still somehow managed to pull in $376M). There are few directors consistently working at this level.
Much was made at the time of its release about the battle between The Prestige and another movie that came out a couple months before it. The Illusionist, starring Edward Norton, Jessica Biel, and Paul Giamatti, was also about an early-19th century magician. When two movies with similar story aspects are released in close proximity like this, they’re called “twin films”. Other examples include: Armageddon and Deep Impact, Antz and A Bug’s Life, and Olympus Has Fallen and White House Down.
This movie is a major contributor to the online conversation around the number of dead women in Nolan’s movies, particularly as a source of pain or motivation for the male protagonists. While I’m not sure I buy that as something significant to Nolan beyond other male (or even female) directors, it is notable that Following, Memento, Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight, The Dark Knight Rises, Inception, and Oppenheimer all feature key female deaths (although in Batman Begins and Interstellar those deaths occur off screen).
I've always loved this one. When the floor goes out and he falls below stage and Borden had moved his bed and he hits the floor. LOL. I mean, that was clever and hilarious. It's such a great tale of rivalry. Everyone did a great job. I completely agree. It's a classic.